[lg policy] Quebec: Health insurance board posts "we speak French in Quebec" signs at service desks

[Harold Schiffman]

 Health insurance board posts "we speak French in Quebec" signs at service
desks
 Posted on 7/17/2015 2:08:00 PM by Emily Campbell
<http://www.cjad.com/cjad-news/author/emily-campbell>
  Sign posted at many desks at RAMQ offices in downtown Montreal
yourstory at cjad.com

A man walked into the health insurance board office to renew his health
card and was greeted with this sign: "Au Québec on communique en français!".

He was aghast.

CJAD visited the downtown Montreal RAMQ offices to verify the signs were
present, and to see how the RAMQ’s Bill 101-inspired language policy is
implemented.

The signs were littered throughout the office, though despite the apparent
statement of official government policy, the employees themselves came off
as more sympathetic to non-francophones.

“Normally if people are talking to me in English and I answer back in
French and they understand, I’m supposed to continue in French,” said a
RAMQ employee. “A lot of people here are immigrants and they don’t speak
French so like I did with you I just switch to English.”

But as listener Jennifer writes in an email sent to CJAD’s Your Story,
having the sign on the desk is too political a tactic for an essential
service.

“It is one thing for an individual, or perhaps even a private company to
bypass laws to impose the language of their choice when operating in a
territory which is subjected by a law which clearly states both languages
are equally official,” she says. “I am disappointed when a public
governmental office chooses to go ‘rogue’ and flaunts it in front of their
taxpayers.”

Jennifer isn’t the only one uncomfortable with the implication.

“It’s weird for us sometimes,” said a RAMQ worker. “We know when you don’t
speak French so it’s kind of weird to speak two languages at the same
time...but that’s the rule.”
http://www.cjad.com/cjad-news/2015/07/17/health-insurance-board-posts-we-speak-french-in-quebec-signs-at-service-desks


-- 
**************************************
N.b.: Listing on the lgpolicy-list is merely intended as a service to its
members
and implies neither approval, confirmation nor agreement by the owner or
sponsor of the list as to the veracity of a message's contents. Members who
disagree with a message are encouraged to post a rebuttal, and to write
directly to the original sender of any offensive message.  A copy of this
may be forwarded to this list as well.  (H. Schiffman, Moderator)

For more information about the lgpolicy-list, go to
https://groups.sas.upenn.edu/mailman/
listinfo/lgpolicy-list
*******************************************
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/lgpolicy-list/attachments/20150718/66baf981/attachment.htm>
-------------- next part --------------
_______________________________________________
This message came to you by way of the lgpolicy-list mailing list
lgpolicy-list at groups.sas.upenn.edu
To manage your subscription unsubscribe, or arrange digest format: https://groups.sas.upenn.edu/mailman/listinfo/lgpolicy-list